Reported By Jacqueline Fell
ORLANDO -- A man, who barricaded himself, four children and another man inside his home on the 1600 block of East Livingston Street Wednesday, was killed when a member of the SWAT team shot him.
"We're always going to do everything we can to protect life, but in the end, my SWAT officers and anybody on the perimeter has to also protect themselves, and any citizens and those children in the house,” said Sgt. Barbara Jones from the Orlando Police Department.
A crisis negotiator made contact with Palin Perez, 36, shortly before 10 a.m. after a long-term girlfriend said she was threatened by Perez.
After more than four hours, he came out of the house. However, Perez had a gun and wouldn't listen to officers.
“The fact that there was a threat and the fact that there were guns in the house, and the fact that there’s several kids in the house, certainly we had to respond to it,” Jones said.
"He was an amazing man," said Sasha Copacevich, a friend of Perez’s.
Perez’s friends said he was a local artist and Gulf War veteran. They also said he was troubled.
"He had post-traumatic stress (syndrome),” Copacevich said. “He had some problems mentally, but that never affected him on the outside. We were all very good friends of him. We all loved him very much.”
The SWAT member who shot Perez will be on administrative duty while the Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigates, which is standard in an officer-involved shooting.
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